All Fun and Games
by NoWaitAuthor
Summary: Garbled overviews.
1. Mello

"Realizing that your life is worthless is worthless in itself."

* * *

He was always an in-your-face type of boy. As a teen he would be vengeful. As a young man he would be self contradictory.

Mello remembered learning two things on the day his family died. One: God does not exist. Two: If God does exist, he is a bastard that enjoys listening to people beg. Like the murderer who lets you pray for forgiveness before death. They let you indulge in a fantasy because it makes for good entertainment. And that's what his family was. Entertainment for a delusional murderer who thought he was the archangel Michael, the "good" angel of death, the one who slays Satan in a forgotten time and a place ruined by crusades. Truly, the man was a fanatic of the same religion as he was at the time. But once he witnessed the "cleansing" of his father and sister from this world, he realized it was useless to keep praying. Instead, he killed the archangel.

Things happened all too quickly after that. After the rage had died down and the malice went cold, Mello knew that he had lost something. Years later he would find out what that something was.

Yes, he knew it now of course. It was his reason to live that he had lost. There was nothing left. No father to make proud. No sister to guard. Not even a God to pray to for forgiveness. No, he couldn't believe in that nonsense after being visited by Michael. That meant he would not be spending the rest of his life doing good deeds as penitence for taking another human life, which in turn meant that his life was void of anything meaningful to him. Even so... He acted as badly as he could to spite a God if there was one. Or maybe just to piss off the people who believed.

Soon after he met little Near in a shitty little orphanage in a place that was far, far away from the archangel's place of descent. What a repulsive little brat that Near was... When he had seen Near the first time, Mello was shocked to see him wearing all white, even his hair was white. Like that faggot Michael. Later he would find out that Near was about as void of life as he was and that pissed him off for some reason. No one had the right to be even more fucked up than him. It wasn't possible, especially for someone frail like Near who surely would have died if he had gone through something as terrible as what Mello himself had. What could Near have endured to become like that? Then an idea... A new reason to take up the cross, just to mock God. This boy was to be his new Michael, another archangel to defeat. But this time Mello would have to take things slowly so as not to lose his reason again. He needed this to last a lifetime so he wouldn't be so empty.

After a while Mello outgrew the orphanage and left on his own terms. His beliefs had changed somewhat and manifested into something new. He realized Near was just a boy, not some new angel to fight against and that he was not a little devil in the guise of a human being. They were just people. However, he knew he was still too confused to delineate Near from his reason to live and so he started competing with him. This turned out to be both good and bad. Near always beat him at the little games he'd play... But if Mello were to ever beat Near, even once, then he'd lose interest. Winning wasn't everything but the game, that was different. The game became life. And winning, well that was just the death a lot of people hoped they would get: a peaceful passing during sleep. Hell no, he hated the idea of that. He'd want to go down in flames. It'd be funny at least, to die that way since he still held onto his religion like how a kid holds onto a seashell found at a beach or a ribbon that was from their favorite Christmas present only to grow up and find it again. Instead of throwing it out, they keep the trash because now it has "sentimental" value.

His memento would be a rosary. Mello wore it around his neck. It bothered anyone who was deeply religious because rosaries were not meant to be worn. He kept it with him all the time, even when he knew he was going out to kill someone or to possibly be killed. Some ignorant people who saw him thought he was religious and that made them trust him a little more. Or it made them fear him a little more. Both reactions were irrelevant to him. Only little Near remembered that he hadn't always wore a rosary. Mello had been quite the loudmouth as a child. Near knew the reason for all of his quirks. Mello didn't know the reason for any of Near's.

When Mello first heard about the spontaneous heart attacks, he had still been in that shitty little orphanage. By then he knew a few people. Near, of course, his rival. There was also Matt, his room mate and the old fart who ran the place or liked to think he did, Roger. And... The mysterious figure of L. Mello admired L in that whoever he or she was; they brought "justice" to "evil doers". He was still amused by things that were similar to his old beliefs of good an evil. Besides, L was a genius and Near was probably going to replace L unless Mello intervened. It was another game to play. There was even a new "God" to piss off. Kira. How pathetic, that another delusional being could be given such a dangerous weapon to use. It didn't help that this particular murderer happened to be smarter than the rest. He wasn't even trying to be an angel like Michael. No, this one was going to become God on earth if he wasn't stopped. Kira was even more annoying and less amusing than Near.

Soon Kira was the object of a race between him and Near. Mello wanted to win this time, he really wanted to win. Not to beat Near, but to be the first to beat God. Not that Kira was a God. He just liked to pretend. He always knew the truth, he never deluded himself and he only fooled people to further his own needs. Mello also never played "games" with anyone who wasn't on his level.

Interestingly enough, Kira was about as tough to beat as Near. That infuriated him... At least Near was someone he could relate to, though he would never say it out loud. They both liked to play dangerous games and they both thought that the ends justified the means. The difference was that Mello still had the capacity to feel guilt, and that stopped him from doing some things that Near wouldn't hesitate to do.

However, this time the game was more difficult. Mello misjudged the power of God and he was burned for it. He laughed though. He still thought of things in biblical terms and phrases but only because, as he figured out before, he held onto the religion from his childhood. Luckily, and old friend helped him out. Matt...

Matt was the sort of person Mello usually wouldn't "play" with. But somehow, they got along. They fought but in general... they got along. Because Matt wasn't as competitive as Near and would always let Mello win. He just didn't have any tenacity for competition. It required too much effort on Matt's part and he was laid back. Matt also didn't remind Mello of anything from his past. It was Matt who could draw him into a sharper view of plain reality. Where there were no special meanings to things, where there were no miracles, where everything could be explained rationally. Mello did need a break sometimes from his games. Sometimes he was too absorbed in them. Matt served as a reminder to Mello not to get too caught up. He didn't want to be stuck in his own imagination and he didn't want to lose his self awareness.

Poor Matt was drawn into the game though. But at least Mello had a real friend with him now. Unfortunately it didn't last long. It dawned on Mello that this game was probably going to be his last. And that he couldn't win... But what he could do was help another player. He tried to make Matt go away but in the end he used Matt because he couldn't do everything on his own. Matt wouldn't have left anyway. He casually said so during a smoke. Finally, Mello made a move that would give Near an edge against Kira. Mello finally stopped calling Kira "God" in his head too, in the last couple of days.

He spoke to Halle one last time so Near would know Mello hadn't just messed up by being too rash again. He watched Matt pack up his equipment. He captured Takada, then saw Matt die. He apologized to empty air. Then he felt pain, it was Michael stabbing him again only worse because he couldn't see what was hurting him this time. But he knew, or at least hoped, that Kira would lose. Mello was out of the game.

Second best again Mihael. Did you have fun?


	2. Matt

"I was always in the background, dedicated to keeping the pieces together. But those were the happiest days of my life."

* * *

Matt was never at the forefront of anything, but that was always his intention. Even at a young age, he enjoyed the company of things rather than people. People just got in the way. People just hurt you with their hands and words. People were the greatest source of pain. Worst of all, people were the ones to bring him into the wretched world.

His family was poor. His first memories were of keeping an eye out for items that could be used again or recycled for a measly deposit. Five cents per can, twenty nickels per dollar... He always tried to at least make ten dollars a day. His mother would be pleased if he made that quota each day. And if not... She would show her disappointment through her words. He quickly learned to block out the noise.

By the time he was seven, he had amassed around ten thousand little bits and pieces of broken technology. He kept them all in an abandoned warehouse that was near the apartment he and his family were squatting in. Whenever he got tired of dealing with people, he'd retreat there to experiment with all the shiny bits of metal. Hard plastics. Fragile glass. Sharp wires. He couldn't make anything of merit, but he began to understand how all the pieces could potentially go together and how they could be altered and made to fit. With these materials at least, he could make them work together. It was something he couldn't duplicate with people.

Finally the day came when his father discovered his hideout. Suddenly he talked much more to Matt and brought him along to meet the people he worked with. Now that Matt was useful, able to repair the third rate shit they sold on the streets, he was an asset. His alcoholic mother couldn't touch him anymore without risking retaliation from his father. Matt grudgingly accepted the protection. He valued the use of his fingers after all.

After a few months, Matt became unbearably bored. All he was doing was fixing clocks and watches and cheap VCRs. If he was lucky, he'd get to work on a television that wasn't outdated or a radio that wasn't scratched to shit. The worse jobs were when he had to talk for his father to a client who wasn't a complete bum. He had the American accent his father lacked. But Matt saw that his voice only upset his parents when he accidentally undermined them in front of others. He practiced copying their words till he could pick up the differences in inflection, syntax, and pronunciation. The skill would manifest itself even further in the future and become a valuable asset to him.

Matt saw his first video game when he was eight. His father had brought him to fix a gray VCR looking thing he'd never seen before, as a favor for some guy who lent them money. The guy had a kid who was a few years older than him. They left the two alone in the boy's room. The only remarkable thing Matt noticed about the other boy was that he wore a cape made out of a little blanket. The kid showed him how the console wouldn't turn on and told him his mother had kicked it by accident. Matt fixed it easily enough, he didn't have to figure how the thing worked, just make sure any parts that were knocked of place were put back. When he was done, Matt got his first gift. Too-large orange tinted goggles from the boy who liked to dress up as super heroes. He kept them because the kid let him play a game too, one where the hero had the same goggles.

Wammy's didn't become his home till his father brought him to some ritzy hotel to fix a monitor. He boasted his son could fix anything, even if he hadn't seen anything like it before. Matt looked up apprehensively at the old man who was unintentionally tempting his father to assign him an impossible task. The old man smiled down at him. As soon as he took a good look at the wiring, he knew the whole thing had been rigged. In the end Matt was able to fix the monitor using borrowed tools from the old man. He looked up at the old man again, silently daring him to say the whole thing was just a test. The old man only thanked him.

A week later a social worker took him away. A week after that he was in another country. The old man never looked him in the eyes after that. Matt told him he shouldn't feel so guilty. The old man said to call him Watari and to decide what he wanted to be called. Matt put on his loose goggles and remembered the kid who wore a cape.

When he got to Wammy's, it was like being a smaller kid again. It was back to basics, learning simple things, not just stumbling in the dark trying to figure it all out alone. Not to say that his intuition was flawed. In fact, being at Wammy's only helped him to expand his knowledge base. He just loved to learn more about the little projects he had done in the past and that he hadn't been wrong. The best part was that here, he didn't have to scavenge for parts. Watari gladly let him be as creative as he wanted. It was like that with all the other kids who wanted to work on their own projects and experiments in whatever field they excelled at. It was around that time that Matt met Near.

Near was the first to initiate contact between them. He commented on Matt's work and said it was like one very complex puzzle. Matt didn't really get it till he saw what Near was doing. Puzzles were on the floor, all of the pieces one solid color. Near was working on three at once. But he said that Matt's puzzle was more difficult because it was more three dimensional than the flat cardboard pieces he was putting together. Matt had been assembling a prototype of a camera of his own design. He looked at Near and wondered if the little boy was making fun of him. Near's puzzle pieces were numbering in the thousands.

After that they started sharing the same communal space and working silently on their own beside each other. The added bonus for Matt was that after Near started working by him, no one else would work in the same room with them. And the room became reserved for them, an unwritten rule keeping the work space clear. Not that it mattered because there were plenty of other rooms for the kids to wander into and toy with their more messy or dangerous ideas, which couldn't be conducted in their bedrooms. Each child had a roommate unless they couldn't handle one for whatever reason, like Near. When Matt did ask why Near didn't have a roommate, Near said he was afraid. Later Matt would wonder if he heard wrong because after that, Near never gave the same answer again.

Matt himself didn't have a roommate for a while. Everyone else already had one and Near was going to stay by himself permanently by his own choice. Matt was glad that he could be alone and still have Near to talk to later. Whenever he walked into "their" room, Near would be there too, already building, stacking, or placing things together, having an endless supply of puzzles and dice and darts and whatever else he felt like handling. Matt had a suspicion that Near was never really focusing on what he was doing and that it was more like going into a trance. Having his hands busy was the best way for Near to begin his thought process, whatever that was. It was only a guess, but Matt never changed his opinion on it.

When he was nine, Matt got his first roommate. Mello had unfortunately caught him with his goggles off on their first meeting and called him a demon. Apparently Mello was a bit of a nut, translating his one brown and one green eye as a sign of evil birth or something. After he fought and lost to Mello, they tried to avoid each other. Inevitably, they fought again. And again. Till they were somewhat friends. Mello would call him some name and Matt would put his goggles on and pretend to ignore him by playing his video games silently. Mello would get annoyed and pine. Matt would offer to play a game with him. Mello would call the game stupid and tell Matt to do something useful. And Matt would listen. In Wammy's they'd find ways to figure out the security system and sneak around and read about things they weren't supposed to. Later, Matt would be setting up security systems and spying for Mello. But that wouldn't be till much, much later...

Matt quickly realized how competitive Mello was. He toned down his own performance to let Mello live with him in peace. Mello was the kind of guy who wouldn't be happy if he was outdone. Though Matt knew that if he really tried, he could be just as good as Mello was at learning the inconsequential things they were tested on. But he didn't care about it that much. He still preferred to work on something real that had practical value to it. Probably remnants of having lived a poor lifestyle and being told book smarts were for rich people. That said, he also realized that Mello and Near could never meet. But eventually... They did.

Mello reacted badly to Near's surface apathetic personality. Matt tried to get Mello to look past it but they were at odds. He did his best to keep them from fighting, or rather to keep Mello from fighting. Once or twice he wasn't able to do it but he always remembered the resulting tussle. Near was surprisingly fast and he knew how to use his small size as an advantage rather than be hindered by it. Matt wished that he had found out why that was. He always wished he had talked more to Near to find out just who the boy had been before Wammy's.

Matt saw L once. Not in person, but on a screen, one that he had actually fixed and set up prior to L using it to speak to the other children at Wammy's. He knew a lot about L already from his and Mello's digging around in what they weren't supposed to. So he had nothing to ask when L opened the floor for them to ask whatever questions they wanted answered about him. To the rest of the kids he was still somewhat of a mysterious role model. He idly listened while he played his game in the back of the room, Near beside him putting together another blank puzzle, Mello brooding about something across the room. Overall, it wasn't that impressive. L had lied to more than half of the kids. And he and Mello knew. Near probably knew too. Matt did usually leave his computer in their work room by "accident."

Teenage Matt was lazy. His habit of toning down had unfortunately become permanent. He was notorious as being the classic underachiever by now at Wammy's, and still, somehow he was in "third place." Watari was replaced by Roger when the old man had to travel. And Roger was a stickler for pushing limits. He'd nag Matt at least once a day to do better, try harder. Matt ignored him and stayed right where he was, in the background of the drama that was Mello versus Near. He kept Mello from blowing up and he kept Near engaged in a life that involved interaction with actual people. He kept the pieces together and figured out how they could work.

Kira fucked up everything. It was all downhill after his appearance. First L and Watari left suddenly. Then through hacking, he, Mello, and Near kept up with the case along side L, Mello and Near always arguing about what was going on. And then the final blow, the death of L.

He couldn't keep Mello from leaving. L's manner of death blew off any chance of Mello acting calmly. And then Roger, stupid, foolish, Roger just had to open his mouth and say L hadn't picked an heir. If it had been Matt, he would have lied. Even if Near had been "chosen," Matt could still have kept them in one piece. Because that was what Mello expected, to be underestimated. Being second actually kept Mello near to well, Near. But that hadn't happened. And Mello lost his temper. And left without any warning.

It was Near who walked into his room and told him what happened. He even apologized, not realizing till it was too late that when he offered to work with Mello, the blond would take it as some sort of insult, as he did with everything Near said anyway. Matt remembered thinking that Near must had been truly shocked by L's death. Otherwise he wouldn't have made such an obvious mistake.

Roger had the audacity to assign Matt a new roommate after Mello left. Not that Matt had time to get to know them. He planned his escape for a few days, since Roger had upped the security to make sure no one else ran off. Mello had been able to leave because of his age. But Matt was close to a year younger than Mello. He knew how to get around though and the only real issue for him was what to bring with him to track Mello.

Before he left, he went to the workroom. Near was there, of course. He was still putting together and taking apart the same puzzle. The one that was all white except for a small, black "L" in the corner. That worried Matt just a little. He almost considered asking Near if he wanted to come with him so the white haired boy wouldn't be alone. But before he could, Near looked up and tilted his head.

"...don't let him kill you."

He stood there for a moment till Near got up and handed him a hand held video game console and said it was for his next birthday, since he was leaving and wouldn't be coming back. Matt took off his old goggles, which hung around his neck since they didn't fit him anymore, and left them on his work bench. He left without saying goodbye and he hoped Near wasn't offended. Matt just couldn't bring himself to be any more sentimental than he was already being. Not to mention Near had just been acting oddly foreboding. It scared him more than he would let himself believe.

After many agonizing months of searching and worrying, he found Mello. Matt never thanked Roger more than he had than when he pulled the blond out of a pile of rubble. Back when Roger still nagged him, Matt had taken up a subject that was totally alien to him. Human biology. The opposite of what he worked with. Now that and his rudimentary first aid skills helped him to save Mello's arm and his face from being too badly burned and scared. The first thing Mello did was glare at him. The second was to ask what took him so long.

Matt worked together with Mello after that. He made sure Mello was less reckless and haphazard while he was still injured. Eventually he took up smoking besides playing video games to calm his nerves. He never knew how attached he had become to his friend till he saw what Mello did in what Matt called the real world. He wasn't at Wammy's anymore. And he was older now; about the age his mother must have been when she had him. He wondered if his parents were still alive when he wasn't busy. He then made sure he was constantly doing something all the time.

He knew Mello would need him for a pivotal part in the chase to apprehend Kira. So he stayed and took orders and dealt with his temper. But Mello never let him feel like he was just a grunt working under some boss. He even got Matt new goggles. Still orange tinted and still large enough to cover his face effectively, at least where Kira was concerned. If half his face was hidden, he was relatively safe. Or maybe it just helped Mello feel more relaxed when Matt went out. He didn't know and didn't ask, concluding that Mello would just avoid answering him as usual.

Matt kept Near in the loop behind Mello's back. In return Near contacted Mello through him, since Mello wouldn't even answer his phone if he knew it was Near calling. It was a strained relationship. Matt could only get Mello to work with Near at a very large distance and in between very long stretches of silence between the two.

When the time came to enact Mello's final plan, Matt smoked much more often than usual. He'd be helping Mello kidnap Takada. He hadn't had to actually deal with people before. Mello never asked him to kill anyone, just to follow and spy. It made Matt nervous now. But he never thought of backing out, not once. They were going to be so close after this, if it all worked out. He was going to play his part perfectly.

He drove, still smoking. The tires squealed when he stepped hard on the breaks and he winced. It had taken a lot to repair the car. He fired his makeshift gun, letting loose a smokescreen for Mello to grab Takada in. He drove away, leading all her bodyguards away and letting them chase him. He'd have to get caught eventually. He just hoped they wouldn't end up beating him up too badly. Or at the least, he hoped his hands wouldn't be broken somehow. He was glad he left Near's gift at home instead of bringing it with him. The long wait before he just did everything he had had been nerve wracking. But he would have killed someone if it had gotten broken by some shitty bodyguards. All the inane thoughts ran through his head as he maneuvered the streets.

Finally, he was cornered. He stepped out, calmly putting his hands up, palms facing away from him. He began to speak but was cut off mid-sentence by a barrage of bullets. He was so surprised that he exhaled with his mouth open, and the cigarette dropped from his lips. Somewhere he was bleeding and it was getting under his goggles. Blood would be hard to get out of the small grooves on the sides, Mello would accuse him of being careless with his gift. No. He was dying and it hurt. No. It happened too fast. God no. Is this what Near meant, "don't let him kill you,"? No. He couldn't have been talking about Mello. More blood got under his goggles.

Did you wish you had done more, Mail my boy?


End file.
